


Ageless

by ladyoneill



Series: Lady O's Teen Wolf Bingo Stories [72]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Immortality, Science
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-26
Updated: 2014-05-26
Packaged: 2018-01-26 14:15:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1691246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladyoneill/pseuds/ladyoneill
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lydia's twenty five when she first notices that nothing about her has changed in nearly ten years.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ageless

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Trope Bingo prompt: Immortality/Reincarnation, and also set in Dark Side Of The Moon (in a later fic there's a reference to Lydia not aging).

Lydia's twenty five when she realizes she hasn't aged since the night Peter bit her. As she went from high school to college her clothes, always fashionable, became more sophisticated. When she was twelve, her mother taught her to apply make-up and she'd always been skilled at doing so. An upswept hair-do, suits, elegant heels, subtle jewelry, and she looked her supposed age.

But, in reality, she's a month away from sixteen, seemingly stuck there.

The lab in the Hale House basement is where Stiles creates his potions, dries his herbs, develops his magic, but it's fully functional.

The day she realizes she isn't aging, she leaves her job in a physics think-tank at Stanford and goes home to lock herself in the lab.

"Okay, Lyds, this isn't funny anymore. You've been in there two days." 

She can tell Stiles is worried. His banging on the door has gotten progressively louder and more annoying, but, over the years, she's learned to tune out so much noise, and focus on the sounds she needs.

Right now she's listening to the centrifuge separating her blood. Three years ago she and Stiles pinpointed the genetic mutation in her DNA that made her a banshee. They didn't examine it much further than that, but now she has to know.

The first day was spent with the books Stiles has hoarded from Peter's library and purchased from esoteric book dealers around the world. The internet is useless for the reality of werewolves and banshees so she ignores that, but there are mentions in ancient tomes of those nearly unique individuals immune to the bite.

They always assumed Peter's bite triggered the gene, but six hours into testing Lydia discovers that was a faulty assumption.

"Dammit," she mutters, running a hand through her tangled hair before tugging it out of her face and back into the pony tail it's fallen out of. Glancing over at the centrifuge, counting down the seconds with the timer, she doesn't realize Stiles has snuck in and is frowning at the mess she's made.

"Lydia, what are you doing?"

"Research," she snaps, not looking away from the time. Fifty six seconds. Fifty five.

"Have you slept since you locked yourself away in here? Eaten?"

She doesn't need his concern and walks over to the machine waiting for the ding.

"Lydia?" 

"Go away, Stiles."

"Yeah, no. My best friend has gone crazy. I think I'll stay."

Thirty two seconds.

He starts rifling through her print-outs and she ignores him, tapping her fingers on the top of the spinning machine, until, finally, it's done. The ding sounds, the machine slows to a stop. With a trembling hand she opens it and takes out four vials.

"Lydia?" Stiles whispers. "What is all this?"

Finally, face free of make-up, eyes shadowed by exhaustion, she turns to face him and demands, "Look at me. Really look at me." 

She can see when he does. When he goes from confusion to humoring her to truth.

"Jesus. You look so...young." Stunned, he sits down hard on a stool and the sheets of paper fall from his hands to the lab table in front of him. "How?"

Holding up the vials, she swallows hard, because it's not in her mind anymore, not a possible self-delusion. "Will you help me find out?"

Stiles nods and grabs gloves from the box, putting them on before taking clean slides from a drawer. "We'll figure this out together. You know nothing can stop the two of us." When he smiles at her, she nods in an odd relief and sinks down at the microscope.

A little over four hours later, after running every conceivable test and a couple they made up on the spot, combining the results with the tiny bit of information from the books, they have the truth.

"We can run it again," Stiles says hesitantly, but she shakes her head.

"We've run it four times. Anatole's treatise supports our conclusions. Those immune to the bite of an Alpha werewolf are immortal. The bite triggers that genetic marker. We always thought I became a banshee because of it, but that was always in me. I'm two things, not just one."

When he reaches out, she gives him her hand and a tremulous smile. "It's okay, Stiles. Just one more freaky thing for our Pack."

Leaning forward, he kisses her cheek. "You know, if any of us should live forever, it should be you. You already watch over all of us. Now..." He flushes and she frowns, then realizes what he was going to say before he stopped himself.

"Do you think I mind the thought of guiding our Pack through the centuries?" Settling into the truth of her existence, she smiles and squeezes his hand.

"Well, maybe? Sorry, I shouldn't but that burden..."

"Stop it," she interrupts. "It's not a burden." Her voice turns haughty but her eyes lighten. "At least, with my guidance, we'll always be the most fashionable Pack around."

Stiles laughs and they hug tightly.

End


End file.
